


And Try Again

by virdant



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: M/M, Reincarnation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-25
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-02-20 06:16:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13140798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/virdant/pseuds/virdant
Summary: and they followed each other, down the crevasse of split earth until there was nothing left but butterfliesif one life fails, try try again.





	And Try Again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [reiicharu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reiicharu/gifts).



> For Rei, who asked for no cannibalism, and a profound love. Merry Christmas. 
> 
> I may have drawn heavily from Shin Band's [Love of a Thousand Years](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2nxr4vj7mk), which remains my favorite love song, and the Butterfly Lovers, which remains my favorite starting point for all love stories.

Their first home is high on the cliffs, overlooking the Atlantic. Will ties fishing flies and fixes boat engines, and Hannibal cooks, on stainless steel appliances that Will cannot bear to look at, because they remind him too much of Baltimore. They do not talk beyond pleasantries and necessities: will you pass the salt and could you buy the milk. In the end, Hannibal frays first, and when he returns home, spotless except for the liver in the cooler, Will takes his hand and they plummet together.

Their first home had been an education. Their eyes had met, and they had known a profound connection. When they had parted, when he had found out that the other had married, when they had finally reunited, everything was frayed, and they followed each other, down the crevasse of split earth until there was nothing left but butterflies.

Their first home was quiet; Will kept his house far from society, and Hannibal kept his house in the city, but it was in the dark silence of branched antlers that they made their home. Even behind bars, under fluorescent lights, in a dozen buildings and a dozen more cities, it was the shadows where they found each other. He took him by the hand, and they no longer knew who was the one who reached forward first, until one of them had blood on their teeth and the other had blood on their hands and they were falling, backwards, over cliffs and into crevasses, and then—

He will stand on the cliffside, a teacup in his hands. He will lift it to his lips and drink—a thousand years of memories—and when he lets go, there will be nothing to catch it except time: the perpetual crash of the tides against the cliff, the perpetual flutter of butterflies upon flowers, and another life waiting for them.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr ([@virdant](http://virdant.tumblr.com)). Thanks for reading.


End file.
